By Lydia Ngwakwe
The Lagos State Water Regulatory Commission (LASWARCO) has sealed three companies for extracting large quantities of groundwater for commercial purposes without proper authorisation and compliance with regulations.
The three companies are Nigerian Bottling Company, producers of Coca-Cola, FrieslandCampina, Peak Milk makers, and Guinness Nigeria Plc.
Mr Olowu Babatunde, Director, Technical Services, LASWARCO, said this during an enforcement yesterday in Lagos.
Babatunde said that LASWARCO had engaged with these companies for over seven years to encourage compliance, but efforts have been unsuccessful.
“We operate a law that empowers us to regulate most of these heavy abstractors in Lagos State. Abstractors are individuals or entities that extract large quantities of groundwater commercially.
“So, these companies that we have sealed – Coca-Cola, FreislandCampina, and Guinness- abstract water in large quantities.
“And we have been engaging them over time. At least, I have been here for more than seven years now. We’ve been engaging these companies for more than seven years now.
“Some, either they do partial compliance, or some don’t comply at all. So, now that we started implementing our regulation, we compel them to fulfill all their regulatory demands,” he said.
NAN reports that the enforcement followed a news briefing on unregulated groundwater abstraction by Mr Tokunbo Wahab, the Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources Commissioner, held on Monday.
Wahab noted that the Environmental Management Protection Law 2017 empowered LASWARCO to regulate groundwater activities and impose penalties for unauthorised abstraction.
He said unregulated groundwater extraction could lead to serious environmental consequences, including land subsidence and groundwater contamination.
The commissioner said that in 2020, the government offered a 75 percent waiver on groundwater abstraction fees, but compliance was low.
He said this necessitated LASWARCO to initiate enforcement actions against defaulters.
He said that letters were issued to non-compliant organisations with a 72-hour ultimatum to comply, and penalties would be imposed on those who continued to operate without authorization.
